Viraayon Authority
The Viraayon Authority is the name of the current political entity that claims sovereignty over the islands of Ankara, Mandraayaruu and Kitaal. A secular, cosmopolitan state, it is supported by a thriving urban economy with very little in the way of fiat money. The ruling class of the Authority are the Manriyu, an organization which has its roots in the ancient Republic of Kitaal. The Viraayon Authority has extensive economic and political involvement in the rest of the world, having established trade outposts as far as claim and currently taking an active part in the political struggles of disputed part of Ollock's claim. The military arms of the Viraayon authority are the Manriyuk Viray, entrusted with the keeping of law and order inside the Viraayon's territories, and the Viraayon Kituub, a profesional standing army of commoners and slaves trained to take conflict to the enemies of the nation. Politics A secular, meritocratic and in principle egalitarian, nationalist state, to a degree inspired by the Old Republic of Kitaal, the Authority is ruled by three separate entities, one executive, one consultive and one military; those are the Chairman, the Viraayonkataala, or Highest Council, and the Kituubataala, the War Council. A Chairman is elected and his term lasts as long as his natural life or they resign, although tradition dictates that 10 years is a reasonable term for him or her to do so. The Viraayonkataala is an assembly of representatives from different professions, economic sectors, political persuasions and geographic regions that elect and council the Chairman. The Kituubataala represents the Manriyu in the palace, and is probably the most powerful of the three mentioned organizations. The Kituubataala rarely affects policy, instead silently observing and providing intelligence to the other two, as well as mediating disputes. However, due to the large size and extensive resources of both the Manriyuk Viray and the Viraayon Kituub, the police and the army, respectively, it holds all the more sway when it does take a position. Viraayon politics are, for the most part, corporatist. High-status individuals from different interest groups, social classes and regions come together and build consensus under the strong leadership of a powerful figure in which short-term political power is strongly concentrated. Under the Chairman serve Departmental Governors, then City Administrators, and then a variety of local marshalls, deputies and lower-level civil servants. A recent state forged in the crucible of international conflict, the Authority keeps a tight but unstable grip on its territories. Since the Great Patriotic War, many state and non-state actors have attempted, with varying degrees of success, to gain influence in with the local nobility, as well as with relevant sectors of the population. Mandraayaruu and especially the department of Kray Loyaan are especially penetrated by foreign interests, the latter being the setting of a veiled war with secret skirmishes between irregular forces aligned with Xcel, more than a few of the more ambitious city-states in Qicui and various Assekae from the Xannaik U to the south. Geography The Authority is divided in seven departments for administrative and legal purposes; each department has a distinct tradition of common law, and is ruled by a Governor with the exception of Kitaal, which is the seat of the state's power. Kray Loyaan in particular stands apart from the rest of the territories, rather independent in culture, slow to adopt the Chairman's edicts and a bit treacherous. However in it there lies the only source of saltpeter in the entire six islands territory, and as such their independent-minded governors and noblement, sometimes considered treacherous and disloyal by the Viraayon loyalists, are, for the most part, tolerated. History First Migrations {C During the region's prehistory, roughly 2000 years before Peace, only western Mandraayaruu was inhabited by people culturally similar to the present-day inhabitants of the Authority, the proto-viraayon. Ankara and eastern Mandraayaruu were dominated by various other cultures, which had varying degrees of familiarity with the proto-viraayon, The ancient inhabitants of Mandraayaru, settlers from Ǧakærirr U to the north, were organized in loose confederations of sovereign city-states and colonies that kept several ties to the northern fatherland. Mandraayaruu became a populous colony with an increasing agricultural sector, developing its own ties to the outside world and its own, distinct culture, even starting to show religious and linguistic divergence from the metropolis in the north. This, plus growing political conflicts with the Empires of Ameci and the Nkwazir, as well as the Xcel islands, put significant stress on the Ǧakærirr crown. Age of Opression The first count of years used in Ankara, Kitaal and southern Mandraayaruu, starts on the year the Ǧakærirr crown declared the Annexation of Mandraayaru. The annexation was carried out in a fast and brutal manner, supressing dissent with public lashings, separating families, and, efficiently applying the principles of shock, the local institutions, and most of social life, had been restructured before a year. This eventually became known as the Opression. It became the first defining feature of the national identity that eventually the peoples of the Six Islands would embrace. The Age of Opression is the historical framework of many of the Six Islands' most popular epics and legends. During this period the Viraayon language took its distinct form, influenced by, and probably evolved from dialects of the Old Assaekik language. It is also during this period that the deep, extensive road network that criss-crosses the forests of Mandraayaruu were constructed. The Ǧakærirr governors insisted on making the woodlands to the interior accesible to their soldiers while, at the same time, various insurgent movements needed roads that weren't being patrolled by the Northerners. As a result, many paved highways, minor roads, and thousands of trails and half-forgotten paths go across the heavy caduceous woodlands of the western island. Regardless of the Ǧakærirr on the coast and in the cities, the densely forested regions of Mandraayaruu were perfect theatres for guerrilla warfare on the part of whichever group that decided to rise against them. As a result, the interior of the island was never truly in the hands of the Northerners. For the most part the unspoken arrangement worked well; the northern governments didn't meddle with the wood people, and the kings and barons of the forest would respect the King's Highways and his cities along coast. Age of Agression (from 429) The Ǧakærirr crown begins a wave of consolidation and unification initiatives to reasserts its control over the southern provinces around the fourth century after the Opression, thus attempting to reintegrate the provinces of Mandraayaru and Ankara, which had distanced themselves from the Ǧakærirr monarchy during the years. In particular, year 429 marks the end of the unsteady peace between the foresters and the northerners on the island of Mandraayaruu, brought about by a royal decree stating that those that weren't either soldiers or noblemen, were forbidden to carry weapons, no exceptions. This was immediately percieved by the foresters as intentionally targetting them. Many foresters were hunters and fishermen, and carrying knifes, swords and bows and crossbows in particular was a deep-rooted cultural tradition. After the messengers from the south delivered the foresters' refusal to accept the prohibition of weapons, the Ǧakærirr army set for the south. This campaign is known as the Second Annexation. The ensuing armed conflict between foresters and the northern armies lasted for years, each generation seeing how slowly but surely, at a great cost of lives to both sides, the northerners gained ground. By 469, thirty years after the second annextion began, All of Mandraayaruu, save for the mountains south of Krat Loyaan, was under Ǧakærirr control. This motivated the republic of Kitaal to ask various states in the nearby Qicui Islands for military and economic aid against the forces of the Ǧakærirr. In the future Kitaal would be ruled by a council of its own elders and senators, and representatives from various states of Qicui, and most of its resources would be devoting to undermining Ǧakærirr authority in the mainland, including stealing caravans of merchandise, looting warehouses, and burning down entire villages. This is known as the Age of Heroism, or the Age of the Manriyu, in the official Viraayon history. Age of Heroism (500) After the Republic of Kitaal became a protectorate under the wing of both the Republic of Makutu and the Horo monarchy began a continued campaign of irregular warfare and political destabilization, as well as a policy of strong support of the illegal trade networks of Ǧakærirr-controlled Ankara and Mandraayaru. The Senate of Kitaal decided, on the five hundredth anniversary of the Opression, to declare open war on the Ǧakærirr crown. To that effect, besides building extensive fortifications all around the island of Kitaal, with watchtowers, ditches and palisades around the entire coastline of the small island, Consul Kataluuk, then in office, founded the Order of the Manriyu , named after the traditional Kitaalian god of war and trickery, a highly trained organization of secret operatives that would operate behind enemy lines blending in with the local population, infiltrate key sectors of the Ǧakærirr economy, military, and civil life, with an especial emphasis on strengthening any and all forms of dissent and resistance to the Ǧakærirr, be they insurgent movements or mere criminals. The Manriyu acted for generations as interlopers, terrorists, kidnappers, blackmailers, spies and smugglers in order to undermine the Ǧakærirr's hold on Mandraayaru, the homeland from which most of the citizens of the Republic of Kitaal came from hundreds of years before. Eventually, the Ǧakærirr empire would collapse under the weight of the internal pressure and the international conflicts in which it was involved. The actual involvement of the Kitaalian secret service, the Manriyu, is, to this day, object of rumours and legends. Age of Peace Category:Contemporary political entities Category:Viraayon Authority